


Callout Post For Rebecca Sugar: I'm In This Photo & I Don't Like It

by TheLillie



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon), The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/M, Kid Fic, Minerva And Duck Need Therapy, Post-Canon, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, SU is a show they're watching
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-20
Updated: 2020-04-20
Packaged: 2021-03-01 16:35:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23760181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLillie/pseuds/TheLillie
Summary: “Somewhere in between learning to summon my shield and finding out my mom is a war criminal.”Four-year-old Beak craned her head over her shoulder to see her mother on the couch behind her. “What’s a roar climinal?”Minerva missed the piece of popcorn in her mouth and bit her tongue.
Relationships: Minerva/Duck Newton
Comments: 11
Kudos: 61





	Callout Post For Rebecca Sugar: I'm In This Photo & I Don't Like It

**Author's Note:**

> i know this is the second m/f fic ive posted in a row besides the draft dump but i PROMISE im still gay dont let this define me

The recommendation for the show came from Aubrey--she'd been really into it as a teen when it was first coming out, and while she didn't stay caught up with it after moving to Kepler (and obviously didn't get any television after moving to Sylvain), she remembered it fondly enough to give Duck glowing reviews and fervent urging to show it to his daughters. Plus, she said they'd probably relate to the main character, since his mom was an epic powerful warrior alien and his dad was just a regular human guy. Well, the phrase Aubrey used was "regular dipshit", but so far Duck had been doing really well about not cursing in front of the kids.

So now here they were, a Newton on the couch and a Newton in the kitchen and two little Newtons sitting cross-legged on the floor. The parents had been sort of skipping around through the series, but the kids had been watching devotedly in order, and were now on the next-to-final episodes of the next-to-final season.

It seemed pretty tame fare so far, considering how near to the end of the series it was. Right now the characters were just cooking and talking about feelings.

_ “When did you get so mature?” _

_ “Somewhere in between learning to summon my shield and finding out my mom is a war criminal.” _

Four-year-old Beak craned her head over her shoulder to see her mother on the couch behind her. “What’s a roar climinal?”

Minerva missed the piece of popcorn in her mouth and bit her tongue. Duck was over in the kitchen washing dishes--he didn’t notice.

“It’s someone who does crimes in a war,” eight-year-old Kelly answered simply.

“Someone who does climbs in a roar.” Duck turned off the water in the sink and turned toward the living room. “What kinda kids’ show is this?”

“It does seem rather more...advanced in its subject matter than other children’s programming I’ve seen,” Minerva replied carefully. Duck slid onto the couch beside her and leaned comfortably into her side. His attention still wasn’t much on her, though--he was fishing around through the bowl in her lap for some more popcorn.

“Except Rose Quartz isn’t the criminal. She’s the good guy,” Kelly declared, lifting her chin. She was a regular old ethics expert now, apparently. “Cus sh--cus they said she’s a criminal cus she killed Pink Diamond, but if she didn’t do that then Pink Diamond would’ve killed the whole planet.”

Minerva accidentally bit her tongue again, hard enough to draw a sharp exclamation of pain. Duck perked up like an attentive puppy, his hand reflexively jumping to hers.

“You can’t kill a planet!” Beak argued. "Planets aren't alive!"

“She was gonna kill everyone  _ on _ the planet. So it’s a good thing Rose killed her first.”

“Well, that seems pretty harsh,” Duck cut in. “Maybe she didn’t really wanna kill the planet, but somebody else pushed her into it, and she felt real sorry after.”

_ “Daaaad.”  _ Beak craned her head back to glare at him, upside-down. “You can’t  _ kill  _ a  _ planet.” _

“If you’re as bad as a Diamond, you can’t be sorry. You’re just too bad and you gotta be stopped.”

On the television, the little boy was going through a montage set to bouncy music, asking townspeople where his friend might be. In the dark blue background of the scene, Minerva caught flashes of her reflection in the glass screen. Duck and Kelly’s argument faded to static in her ears, and static faded to insectoid screams, then to rattling coughs, and to shallow breaths, and to silence. And it was silent, and it was silent, and she was staring at her own warped reflection in the dark glass--

And then the scene transitioned to the inside of a bright living room and her reflection vanished and Duck was squeezing her hand.

Minerva sucked in a deep breath and looked down at him. The argument seemed to have ended--the girls were sitting quietly, and he was looking at her intently.

“You still with us?”

She nodded and stood. “I’m going to wash the popcorn bowl.”

“Is the popcorn all gone?” Kelly asked.

Beak gasped. “I want more popcorn!”

“Nope, I’m cuttin’ off y’all’s popcorn tonight,” Duck said, leaning forward to affectionately poke the top of Beak’s smooth round head. “In fact, I think it’s time to get ready for bed.”

The girls each launched into their own protests and counteroffers, but Duck was holding firm--he wouldn’t need help persuading them. Minerva held the nearly-empty bowl in the sink and turned on the faucet over it. She tilted and rotated the bowl back and forth; first to flush out the last remnants of popcorn, then just to vary the pitch of the water’s sound. If she kept the rushing hum random enough, she could keep it from turning into white noise that’d turn back into silence.

“You can pause it and watch the rest tomorrow. Beak, c’mon, dude, you still need to try on those new jammies Uncle Kirby sentcha today.”

At the reminder of her exciting new pajamas, Beak leapt to her feet and zoomed to her bedroom. Kelly stubbornly stayed put, eyes still glued to the end of her show.

Duck waited for a minute. Then, the moment the program gave way to the channel logo, he lifted the remote and flicked the screen off. “Time to stop watching, kiddo.”

Kelly whined, offended. “But the next episode is--”

“Moose.”

Kelly closed her mouth at the nickname. He didn’t only use it in serious situations, but when he did, she knew the conversation was over.

"Fiiiine," she surrendered, standing and trudging toward the bathroom.

"Help make sure Beak brushes her teeth, too." Duck gave her ponytail a light tug as she passed him. She swatted at his hand, but was already out of reach.

Duck glanced back at the kitchen, where Minerva was silently putting away the dishes he'd left to dry on the counter. He laid the remote on top of the television set and sidled up beside her.

"We don't have to let the kids keep watching that show," he said softly, bumping her with his hip.

Minerva slid a mug into the cupboard and spoke without looking at him. “I fear Aubrey Little will be disappointed if we reject her recommendation.”

“She knows the deal. She’ll understand.”

She shoved in another mug. It clattered and clanked against its cupboardmates.

“Don’t break anything.”

"Duck Newton, when I told you the truth of my...of the two worlds I killed," Minerva said, turning to him brusquely, "I thought I would never see you again. I thought the consequences, your inevitable hatred of me, would be...well, out of sight, out of mind."

Instinct wanted him to immediately deny any hatred, but sense kept him quiet.

"I do not think I could endure losing the trust of our daughters.”

Duck clicked his tongue and was quiet for a moment, searching for the right words. He leaned forward and loosely folded his arms atop the counter. His shoulder rubbed close against Minerva’s bicep.

“Hon, that’s just something every parent’s gotta go through at some point,” he said. “Not now, and not--I mean, usually not to this degree, but…”

Having run out of dishes on the counter, she fished the popcorn bowl out of the sink and lightly shook water droplets off it.

“Like, I was Moose’s age when I found out my mom liked this name so much cus of, y’know, Mister Las Vegas, but when I was twenty-three I found out she had a full-on fetish for the guy and me and my sister were both conceived with Ferris Bueller on in the background.” Duck shook his head. “I couldn’t look her in the eye for, like, a year after that.”

Minerva lightly snorted, but covered her mouth with her hand before a smile could form.

"But then I got over it," Duck finished. "Y'know, you get older, you realize your parents are real people with some bad fuckups under their belt, and then you realize you're an adult too with your own fuckups and it all evens out. You learn to forgive each other."

Her mouth sank from an almost-smile to an almost-frown.

"And therein lies the paradox," Minerva said, almost whispering now. "I could not stand to lose their affection, and yet...I could not dare to let them forgive me."

Duck's brow furrowed.

“Why?”

Minerva bit down and tasted blood--this time on purpose.

And Beak slid triumphantly into the kitchen. “Ta-daaa!”

Minerva looked down. Beak had her arms raised high above her head to show off her pajamas--a full-body onesie covering her from head to toe in light brown fur, interrupted by a diagonal stripe stitched to look like a belt across her chest and pouch on her hip. The hood came down over her eyes and was decorated with a familiar sci-fi face. She was a picture-perfect miniature Chewbacca, straight out of a Star Wars holiday catalog.

“Heyy, it fits!” Duck proclaimed. “Can you do the noise?”

Beak wrinkled her nose and made a sort of gargling roar sound in the back of her throat.

"Alright, not bad, not bad--"

She made the noise again, this time looking up at Minerva for approval. Minerva smiled and effortlessly lifted Beak up onto her hip.

"You do it," Beak ordered, poking Minerva's cheek.

"Soft hands, Beacon," Minerva replied automatically, gently nudging Beak's finger away from her face. But then she cleared her throat, furrowed her brow, and calculated the right shape to open her mouth into. Finally, out came a flawless, uncanny, undeniably inhuman Wookiee growl. Duck whistled, and Beak cackled.

Kelly shuffled into the kitchen next, and wrapped herself around Minerva's free arm. Her pajamas were less exciting than Beak's, but just as loved--wash-worn pink striped pants and an oversized old Green Bank Telescope t-shirt. They'd changed the logo for the place a few years back, and Dr. Drake sent them a couple new shirts, but those were actually in the kids' right sizes and thus were for daytime wear. This relic had been starting to ride up Duck's stomach sometimes, but on Kelly it was a perfect almost-nightgown.

"Are we ready to sleep for the night, Newtons?" Minerva asked. "Have we sufficiently cleaned our teeth, gums, and tongues?"

Kelly quietly nodded, her curls scratching against Minerva's arm. Beak proved herself with a proud huff of vaguely minty breath in Minerva's face.

"Can we have a song?" Kelly asked.

"I dunno," Duck said, leaning against the counter. "Is Mommy feeling up to a song tonight?"

Kelly tilted her head up and batted her eyelashes.

Minerva bent and scooped her up onto her other hip. Duck grinned and shook his head, never not impressed by her casual feats of sheer strength--despite the fact that he could probably just as easily do the same. Power of the Chosen One, but the man was in his fifties now, didn't wanna risk throwing his back out.

"Yes," Minerva said. "Always."

* * *

When the girls were asleep and Minerva shut their bedroom door, Duck was leaning sideways against the wall, a tired smirk on his face.

"Can I tell you something about that show?" he said.

Minerva glanced carefully at the closed bedroom behind her. "Will Kelly be angry if she overhears this?"

"Oh, hella." He extended a hand, and she let him pull her back to the living room as he talked. "So, uh, I got hooked and binged the whole rest of the series on the internet without y'all. And I got a major spoiler that I think'll ease your nerves a little."

"You are a scoundrel, Wayne Newton." She wasn't all that surprised--he'd done the same thing with both the gravity show and the infinity show.

He sat her down on the couch, keeping a serious hold on her hands between them.

"Rose Quartz didn't actually kill Pink Diamond for invading Earth," he said. "Rose Quartz  _ is _ Pink Diamond, and what happened is she regretted invading Earth so she faked her death and then saved everything."

Minerva blinked.

"That is a major spoiler,” she said. “That--that is a game-changer."

Duck nodded, smiling. "And she keeps saving everything, and becomes this great hero of Earth, and it's after all this that she meets her regular human dipshit and falls in love and just...lives happily ever after. Learns to forgive herself. And the whole show's about forgiving people, no matter what they did, so long as they're doing good things now."

"That is not how Kelly made it sound."

"Ye-a-h, I think she mighta just gotten hold of a bad discourse blog or something. We're gonna have to watch her internets a little better." Duck waved a hand. “Now this--I’m not sayin’ this for the show’s sake. Cus if it’s triggering then I’m not gonna try to pressure you to watch it. I’m not gonna put you through that anymore. I’m just…”

He drew back his hands a little, shifting their hold on Minerva's. Now instead of loosely letting their fingers rest hooked around each other, they were palm to palm, interlocked.

“I think the girls are gonna forgive you," Duck said. "And I think you deserve to forgive yourself.”

Minerva sat in silence, watching his expression. She focused on one dark brown eye, then the other.

Finally she sighed and let her forehead fall against his. He closed his eyes and brought their intertwined hands up to their chests; they breathed in; they breathed out.

She tilted her face just enough to kiss him. He accepted it readily, catching her mouth soft but sure with his own. It was warm, natural, familiar; he felt like home. She'd spent centuries entrenched in the ordinary world of her native planet, first in war, then in isolation, thinking she'd never know anything after--but even a single day with him, here on Earth, with the home and the family they'd built together, made it feel like she'd never need to know anything before. 

"There's," Duck broke away, "...another thing I wanted to talk to you about tonight, that's kinda related to the show."

Minerva opened her eyes.

Duck had his lips pursed tight, cautious but decided. "I think we oughta take Juno up on her therapy suggestion."

This time Minerva's sigh was more of a huff. "Duck Newton, we have discussed this at length already. The things you and I have been through--no human on this planet, even a trained professional, could possibly be equipped--"

"I know--I know nobody's good to handle the, the space stuff. The intergalactic tomfoolery. But--just hear me out." He squeezed her hands. "There's human beings on earth who've been through war. There's human beings who've seen and done terrible things. Humans who've...been pushed around and lied to and coerced into doin' things. Humans who can write and act out these kinds of shows that hit us so hard where it hurts--" A self-deprecating laugh entered his voice. "They've got a whole sequel series 'bout finding your purpose after the magic cosmic destiny's all played out, made me bawl my fuckin' eyes out--"

"I do not wish to continue watching this show."

"You don't have to," Duck said quickly. "That's not your preferred catharsis." He grinned. "Maybe after this when we know the kids are sound asleep, we can go pull the swords outta the closet 'n' go out back 'n' spar til we're too horny to not just...or too tired. Just whatever gets the energy out."

Minerva smirked.

"But I texted Leo the other day," Duck said, "and he says it's been working for him. He says the therapy's been helping. And I know...that if Juno hears that we actually took some advice from her, that she's gonna be insufferable--"

"Oh, she would be a pain in the ass."

Duck's grin widened. "God, I love hearin' you swear."

"Ass. Bitch. Damn."

"Stop it, you're distracting me. We're still talking about therapy." He tapped his fingertips on the back of her knuckles. "I dunno how much of it insurance would cover, so we'd have to dig into our pockets a little, but I know it'd be worth it."

Minerva rubbed her thumb across Duck's hand.

"I will think about it," she said. "I'll let you know."

Duck smiled. "That's good enough for me."

He kissed her again, short and sweet. And then she ran a knuckle along his jawline, and he kissed her again, and again, longer and a little less innocent.

"Swords, then, Wayne Newton?" she said softly.

"Loser has to fold all the laundry for the week."

Minerva scrambled off of him and hit the floor; and, shoving and laughing like children, they both took off running for their weapons.

**Author's Note:**

> (after they watch a single pale rose)  
> duck: see this is why mommy didn't wanna watch this with us anymore, cus she really relates to this character and you badmouthing her kinda hurt her feelings  
> kelly: can't believe my own mother is a fudging pink diamond kinnie


End file.
